The modern world, I would say, was built on a major sector of its economy which is power, to a layman it is called electricity. As the name implies, it powers all technologies in use and those that will be the product of innovation in the near future either directly or indirectly. The basic needs of man in today’s world include adequate power supply. In my country, the concept of power outage has been one of the main issues that a good number of citizens have. Frankly, conventional politicians have always come in their glory to proclaim fake promises to fix the occasional power outage completely. Well, to an extent, they tried. I digress ...
Power outage (or blackout) especially at important times is never what you’d wish even your enemies. One of those times was the post-covid time when life was waking up from the previous year. School resumed, transportation was coming up and so on. As a student who was already tired of the long duration of sitting at home, not like I had any other choice because I could not just go out or anything. I went back to school just a week after the official resumption date.
No sooner had I gotten back to school than an issue came up. Somehow the electricity distribution company had brought the bill - an outrageous one at that, and no one knew when it came. Someone just hung it by the gate of my hostel as if he knew some hell could let loose by the content of the bill.
Prior to the the advent of the pandemic, we had finished the final exams of the sessions and normally the co-tenants were very cooperative such that every bill that was brought was 100% cleared. No bill for a month lingered to the other. When the lockdown was relaxed the same year, I travelled to my hostel twice and each of those times was evidently with blackouts. Those who decided to stay behind or who were locked down and could not travel home or elsewhere severely complained of the intensity of the outage. They could even manage an epileptic power supply.
Through some calculations, we got to understand that the distribution company added all the bills for each month as if there had been constant power (or what was being provided before). I remember we finished exams by January, and the lockdown got intensified by March/April. Now, imagine you getting a bill for about 9 months of power supply you didn't use one bit. It was that bad. I said earlier that we do clear every bill every month. We came back to meet a bill of about 120 thousand naira ($120) up from just about 5000 ($5) per month. Which begs the question - Why, where and how?
Normally, what I do hear is that when there is some form of power outage that lasts for months, there is an unwritten rule that there won’t be any form of a bill for that time duration. When the officials from the distribution company threatened to disconnect the line, we vehemently agreed, honestly because we could not afford to pay any dime for that ludicrous thing. Even if we could, we aren't paying sh't. Somehow, the landlord later ‘sorted’ the issue How? I don’t know and I don’t care. However, it ensured that the landlord got a prepaid meter later on to avoid any stories that touch moving forward.
The level of power outage in my country is so severe, even when you clear all they will look for a way to add something. The best thing for me is to go for a prepaid mitre.
Glad to read from you today
Yes, really. The prepaid meter is the best way to avoid being over charged over the unstable supply.
Thank you for reaching out @hivedeb 😌
Seriously those PHCN people can be really annoying. And I would have done thesame by not paying a dime like you did. A prepaid meter is often the best choice and way out .
The thing is, if the bill was only a little, we could agree to offset it, but it was just too much. And they now threatened to disconnect it, I still remember that day, it was a woman in charge of our school area. We told her point blank to tell her electrician to come cut this lines away. They didn't at last..I guess they were marvelled..😅
Thank you for your input,mama @monica-ene
Such a situation and condition is very relatable, I can't pay for electricity i did not make use of, this is the reason why they brought about a prepaid meter in my residence because this almost brought chaos.
Electricity is one of the most important needs because through adequate electricity supply, one could carry out his or her daily jobs if they work with computers and machineries also through constant electricity you have a better life.
If the power supply was stable and the bill wasn't up to that, we could find.a way to pay. But no! Not today..😅
Similar thing also happened in my previous hostel after the covid-19 era. We all came back and saw a bill of 240k and the power company insisted that we pay it. Our landlady back then and her lawyer sorted things out and she also repaid the prepaid meter that has been lying Dormant for years. What those power company do is estimated billing, they just look at the size of the house and "fix" a certain amount of money to be paid, whether there was constant power supply or not
Honestly, that thing caused uproars in lots of hostels. For those that had light through out the lockdown and we're in their hostels claim they were even overcharged, let along we that didn't get light for months, were not even present for that same duration.
It's that bad, @kushyzee
It is very crazy. There will be power outage and the money will even be increasing
That's insane
I wonder why they do that devilish act. Why will I pay for something I did not use?
I tell you!! To an extent, I think it's just the system that is filled with loopholes that they are exploiting. And the organisation called SERVICOM - I see no usefulness of them!